(Diaphragma), in Anatomy, a part vulgarly called the midriff, and by anatomists septum transversum. It is a strong muscular substance, separating the breast or thorax from the abdomen or lower venter, and serving as a partition between the abdominal and the thoracic viscera. See Anatomy Index.

It was Plato, as Galen informs us, who first called it diaphragm, from the verb diaparein, to separate or be between two. Till his time it had been called ψέμα, from a notion that an inflammation of this part produced phrenzy; which is not at all warranted by experience, any more than that other tradition, that a transverse section of the diaphragm with a sword causes the patient to die laughing.

DIAPHORESIS (Diaphoresis), in Rhetoric, is used to express the hesitation or uncertainty of the speaker.

We have an example in Homer, where Ulysses, going to relate his sufferings to Alcinous, begins thus:

Τι πρῶτον τὸ ἀνίσιλα, τι ὑπὸ νεκρῶν καταλήξω; Quid primum, quid deinde, quid postremo alloquar?

This figure is most naturally placed in the exordium or introduction to a discourse. See Doubting.

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